I hate Christmas!

If anybody from the office asks you if you know who has been turning off the Christmas lights around here, tell them you don’t know anything about it, and that it isn’t me.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I’m reposting this piece, written by Maoi Arroyo in her blog, Manilenya, to remind us of the things we as Filipinos should be thankful for.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino!
The desperately unpopular view of our country from an urban curmudgeon

Another year is going by, and as I do each day I am privileged to draw breath, I thank God once again for His funky sense of humor and His attention to detail. Everyday, I find myself thinking: Thank God, I’m a Filipino!

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! Heir to the genius of Rizal, the words of Recto, the spirit of Bonifacio, the diplomacy of Sultan Kudarat, the eloquence of Tañada, the bravery of Sakay and Tandang Sora, the style of Moreno and Natori, the voice of Andion Fernandez, the art of Amorsolo and Manansala, the science of Zara and Velasquez, and the exquisite bounty of nature that we never seem to have logged or polluted to shreds.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! Vibrantly alive in this vortex of the surreal, where penitents shed blood, decorations are made from rice and nacre, pride in one’s children is broadcast from the trunks of taxi cabs and the mudguards of jeepneys, where people offer you food as a reflex and bow low if they have to pass between two people (or between you and the TV).

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! With a diverse culture that is as colorful and as full of flavor as the halo-halo. Here you can get music from Europe and America, anime from Japan, telenovellas from Korea and Mexico, and pirated versions of everything. Here we have a thriving population: 40% of them singers and dancers, 20% of them vocal impersonators and back-up dancers, which still leaves 16.8 million Pinoys who are better off as audience members!

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! With over-protective, incredibly conservative, “wat kind of a girl comes home at dis time op da nite”, wonderfully flawed and uniquely great parents; with a never-ending stream of relatives; with “Manang” and “Kuya”, with“po” and “opo”; with cantankerous and loving grandparents who would not think twice about conking me on the head with their baston if they thought I was misbehaving; with an extended family by joy and tears if not by blood: our staff, our friends, our colleagues.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! For every bad habit you can name, the other side of the coin is a good one. The only difference is the edge of the coin, which I call discernment and balance. Pinoys love their families and like to get good deals for their friends, which sometimes leads to nepotism and corruption, but is also responsible for filial piety and expansive business networks. Pinoys are ingenious and resourceful, which sometimes leads to intricate schemes and plots, but also leads to creativity and innovation. Pinoys are ambitious, which sometimes leads to crab mentality, but can also fuel our successes. Pinoys take everything personally and are loyal to individuals – not concepts, which leads to a lack of civic duty and nationalism. But if we extended our definition of the family or clan to include the entire nation, we would rule the world. Call me whatever you like and laugh at me for my optimism; but I assert that Filipinos are a wonderful, if ill-disciplined, people.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! Because if you want to find someone who can do something well and quickly, it will be a fellow Pinoy – someone who is too busy catering to the demands of his boss, his spouse, his kids, his sprawling extensive family, his barkada, and has a side-line selling used mobile phones to boot. This is the kind of person who will do acceptable work in the most expedient manner possible. And he can do so with limited or no funds, electricity, water and computers!

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! While in England, people thought I was loving – simply because I didn’t confine my affection to dogs and horses. While in America, people thought I was cute and “too nice” – simply because I was short and treated others with respect. And now in Manila, people are so unused to a reasonable level of initiative, efficiency, accountability, compassion, and the open declaration of a win-win agenda that I have fooled other people! Were I of any other nationality, I would be mediocre; in Manila, I am a refreshing oddity.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! One of 84 million curmudgeons who laugh because it is too painful not to, who know we will never have a fiscal crisis because it would run counter to the oligarchy’s interests, who know that we should never drive around at 4pm lest we run into hungry traffic cops, who know that our government is corrupt and our countrymen are petty, but find ourselves donating to relief efforts, paying taxes and helping each other out anyway. The idiotic optimism of our people is responsible for paying for my high school education and subsidizing my six years in college. The knowledge I learned – both in success & failure, within the classroom and outside it – enabled me to study abroad.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! Because speaking of idiotic optimism, if there’s one other thing that Pinoys have in common its insanity. Don’t believe what the media tells you – bad news sells. There is a large and growing number of people who are not only crazy enough to stay here, they actually love it! Who else but a Pinoy could thrive in the Philippines? Lunatics like my long-suffering teachers, unsung and paid a pittance their entire careers, but dearer to me than I could ever express. Basket-cases in the public sector: rural doctors, honest government workers (they do, indeed, exist); Weirdos in the private sector: the charities and foundations, the Brain Gain Network, thousands of enlightened entrepreneurs and business owners. Senseless acts of kindness and honor happen everyday and an incredible amount of money is made honestly in this country; unheralded and unnoticed by all.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! Our unfinished revolutions – which are actually grand parties where fictional speeches are made, singing, dancing and prayer go on into the night and you invite everyone via text to participate – are a remarkable display of democracy. A democracy that may not be working very well, but saves us from being invaded in the name of “liberation”. A democracy that preys on its own people and will eventually force everyone to wake up, keep praying (and complaining) but CHANGE. Eventually it will be so detestable that we will realize that to try to change the system is like trying to boil the ocean, but to change ourselves (pain in the butt that it is) is the only solution. Thank God, that you drive us so relentlessly towards personal responsibility and integrity. Without the avarice and incompetence around us, we would remain the teenagers of the earth: possessors of freedoms we misuse and abuse, civic duties we neglect, and consciences we openly deride.

Thank God, I’m a Filipino! Thank God we suffer so! No nation or individual in the entire course of human history has become great without suffering. Thank God for the pollution, the crime, the poverty, the squalor and the misery. Thank God for all the people who moan and bitch and complain, thank God for all the people who pray and weep and proclaim: “Something has to change!”

Filipinos are not grateful or optimistic, we hate ourselves because we see nothing good in our country. We laugh because it would hurt too much not to, we complain because it would be too risky to act. So we should make it a point to remember our history and teach it to others. Not merely our centuries old struggle against colonialism but also the more recent fight for justice, fairness and prosperity. We should visit the newly re-opened Ayala Museum, and take our kids with us. We should pass on good news, and there is a lot of it to be found! Though the infidelities of artistas are more newsworthy than the years of hard work of Dr. Carmencita Padilla and our Lingkod Bayan awardees or the laudable conduct of our relief and rescue workers, there is more good news than bad. The bad news is just more fashionable. But something has to change first!

Filipinos have no self-discipline, we do not follow the rules because no one else does. So we must do the right thing, adhere uncompromisingly to our moral standards. We cannot control the behavior of others, but we can control what we do. We are a country rich in faith, both in quality and in diversity, but whether we proclaim the Apostle’s Creed or the Shahada, there is one thing I’m sure we would all agree on: If we are only good because of fear of punishment and hope for reward, then the faith we posess is hollow. If we were better Catholics, Christians, Moslems, Hindus, Jews and Buddhists; we would be better Filipinos. If we were to say: “I do the right thing and I do it for myself, no matter what the conduct of others”, then you would see a renaissance. But something has to change first!

Filipinos are petty, so we must stop being petty ourselves. We have shot down ideas and shut down programs, not because of their quality but because they were born in the minds and built by the hands of a rival or a predecessor. Our definition of success is individualistic, even though our own history teaches us that no radical change has ever occurred in this country that did not incorporate the goals of the powerful with the goals of the many. The government cannot be depended on, so we must think of public-private partnerships, of entrepreneurship for economic development. But something has to change first!

Filipinos are corrupt; our government is incorrigible, our children are gambling, cheating each other on Ragnarok, addicted to whatever drugs they can afford, our graduates do not meet the standard of education that industry requires; so we must donate to our schools, both public and private. We must give back to teachers the luster of their profession and the dignity that comes with a proper salary. We must think of win-win situations, of living in integrity. But something has to change first!

That something is me.

That something is you.

So to hell with what the world, the media, the millions of cynics may say! Because “yes, the Filipino can” and soon the Filipino will! I refuse to lose hope in the Filipino, because I refuse to lose hope in my family and friends, I refuse to lose hope in myself. Thank God, I can change. Thank God, I can work, inspire, lead, act and care!

Whatever else the future brings, thank God, thank God I’m a Filipino!

You fit into me

You fit into me
like a hook into an eye

A fish hook
An open eye

Margaret Atwood

Sacrifices (conclusion)

Sacrifices
(Conclusion)
written by Conrado de Quiros
published on the Philippine Daily Inquirer, April 22, 2004

I’M glad Ibarra Gutierrez wrote what he did. I have at least someone to point to (other than myself) to show the alternative is by no means hypothetical; it is real. The choice of coming back to the country, or indeed staying put, may now take on the aspect of the road not taken, or the one littered with sharp stones, but as Gutierrez shows, that is the illusion and not the reality. It is the paradise espied in the distance that is the illusion and not the reality. Or it is the mirage and not the oasis.

I had a similar experience when I was in the United States three years ago. The salesman in the department store where I bought a memory stick for a camcorder was a Filipino, and he was absolutely delighted when he discovered I was a “kababayan” [fellow countryman]. He said he thought at first I was Japanese. I wanted the 128 MB, but they had only the 64 MB. But not to worry, he said, he would order the 128 and it would be there the following week. I thanked him but said I wouldn’t be around the following week. He gave me a card, saying he’d keep me abreast of sales the department store would have in future, and asked me where I was going. He was absolutely discombobulated when I said back to Manila. I swear his jaw fell. He could not grasp the idea.

He asked me what I wanted to do a damn fool thing like that for, or that was the subtext of his more polite question. I said I had a job in Manila. He countered that there were jobs in the United States and they paid better. He himself had been a high school teacher in the southern province of Iloilo, he said, and he could barely support his wife and two kids with his pay. He had gotten to the United States only after much effort. He was denied a visa several times, but he persevered and managed to get one in the end. I did not ask him what kind. He took one odd job after another until he became a clerk in the department store. By dint of hard work, he eventually got promoted to the camera section. He would never dream of going back to Iloilo, he said.

Like Gutierrez, I have heard friends in the United States explain me away almost apologetically (to themselves most of all) as being a “nationalist.” That presumably is the reason I am not joining them in the land of the free and brave, free enough to work your ass off for the cottage with the picket fence and brave enough to endure cold, exile and meaninglessness to do it: I am a “nationalist.”

Well, if “nationalist” means to continue to believe in this country, notwithstanding resolute proof of its predilection for suicide, and armed only with the vision or hope it can be better, then I guess I am a nationalist. If “nationalist” means to read our history or know the past, something most Filipinos refuse to do, and having it for guide to glimpse the way to the future, then I guess I am a nationalist. If “nationalist” means to relate to other people as a Filipino, as someone who has a home, an identity and pride in his national patrimony, who has “malasakit,” or can feel deeply for his country, then I guess I am a nationalist.

It is no big deal, it is what the people of other countries have. And it is a testament to our impoverishment that what is routine and natural and obvious to them take on the aspect of epic heroism for us.

But it isn’t just this that drives me to stay here and try to make things better, however seemingly hopeless that has become, no small thanks to a procession of vicious leaders who seem determined to send this country hurtling to the precipice. Not least this last one, who is now depleting the national coffers to remain in power. Gutierrez hits the nail on the head when he asks, what are you really giving up when you choose to stay here? Unless you are an overseas Filipino worker who is compelled to leave from the stark choice of living or dying, toiling in the desert or starving in a lush land, what sacrifices are you making?

You are not going to starve on a teacher’s pay, however small that is. You are not going to starve on a journalist’s pay, however iniquitous it is. And you are not going to starve on whatever material rewards come from working in an NGO, exercising a profession (engineering, law, architecture, medicine, priesthood), or painting, playing music and writing, however meager they are. Arguably, you will earn more elsewhere, notwithstanding that you are reduced to being a maid in Kowloon, a caretaker in Toronto, or a salesclerk in a camera shop in Los Angeles. But that brings us to the heart of the matter:

All you really lose is a “pursuit of happiness,” a right enshrined in the Constitution, that has to do with acquiring more and more — or at least more than the next fellow. That is the largely unquestioned premise of this monumental Diaspora, the rod by which we measure success. You are a doctor in this country, you compare yourself to what Filipino caregivers abroad get and you will be envious. But you compare yourself to the bedraggled mass huddling in a tiny corner of this wretched metropolis, and you will consider yourself lucky. You are a public school teacher, you will be hard put to buy your two kids chicken dinners from a Jollibee fast-food restaurant every week. But you will be able to buy them shoes and books and send them to school where the barefooted and tubercular farmer fighting off pests in the fields won’t.

Frankly, I too cannot understand that attitude of many Filipinos in the United States who say that if this country can only provide them jobs and investment opportunities that will allow them to enjoy the amenities they have there, they would not think twice about repairing here. Gutierrez is right: thankfully, he doesn’t have to demand those conditions to want to live here. I don’t either.

I figure I’m not the one who’s making sacrifices. They are.

Seeing the things that really matter

I’m reposting an article that was originally published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer on April 21, 2004.  I hope we can all pick up something from it.

Sacrifices
written by Conrado de Quiros

IBARRA Gutierrez has written a very inspiring piece that surprisingly hasn’t yet found its way in print. So I have the honor of doing it for him.

Gutierrez says he’s finishing his master’s degree in New York, where he’s lived the past year, and is all set to come home soon. Not just to revisit for a while but to reoccupy his teaching post in the University of the Philippines (UP). This has raised no small amount of eyebrows from Filipinos and Americans alike. He is graduating this May, and it’s all his friends can do to understand why on earth he doesn’t just stay put and get a job there. But Gutierrez hasn’t just defied convention in not opting to remain in New York, he has defied reason in having no reluctance to go back to Manila. I reproduce his piece in its near entirety, it’s worth every column inch of it:

“It is this lack of regret, no, this utter joy, at leaving the supposed center of the universe for a backwater Third World country that has baffled so many of the people I have met here. Many of them — a few Americans but mostly Filipinos (or former Filipinos) — seemed to assume that since I was fortunate enough to make it to the States, I would want to stay here permanently. So many times in the past months, I have found myself in the awkward position of having to actually justify why I intended to go back to the Philippines as soon as my studies concluded. I just found it inordinately difficult to come up with reasons for wanting to go home, when this was a decision that seemed so fundamental, so natural, so obvious, that I never really thought I would ever have to defend it before anyone, least of all other Filipinos.

“But explain it I had to do, over and over-to relatives, to friends, to classmates and acquaintances. ‘I just feel that I would be happier, and be more useful, working back home,’ I would say, somewhat apologetically, as if by expressing a desire to stay in the Philippines I was somehow giving offense in some peculiar way. This rather weak response would usually be met with tolerant, half-embarrassed smiles and comments on how much of a sacrifice I was making. What I have never figured out is whether they thought I was a hero or a fool for choosing to make that ’sacrifice.’

“Personally, I do not think of myself as either. What is more, I do not even believe that I am making a sacrifice at all.

“By choosing to go home, what am I giving up, really? It is not as if by working in Manila I am choosing a life of starvation, deprivation, and abject poverty as compared to the life of wealth and comfort I will supposedly have working in the United States. Certainly on my modest salary from UP — where I work as a member of the junior faculty — I will never grow rich, and (thanks to John Osmeña), I will probably never be able to rise above the poverty line by any appreciable margin either. But, with a little extra effort, I will be able to maintain an acceptable level of dignity for myself and my family. Is giving up what amounts to a few extra perks then such a noteworthy sacrifice?

“Unlike so many of our OFWs who are forced to go overseas to work for a few years as manual laborers and domestic helpers, my situation, like the situation of so many other university-educated, middle-class Filipinos, does not involve a choice between starvation and survival. Rather, it involves the less spectacular and more prosaic choice of renting a two-bedroom apartment in Quezon City or owning a sprawling house in a New Jersey suburb; of commuting on a UP-Pantranco jeepney or driving the latest model SUV; of making do with a Third World salary or insisting on being paid in the Almighty Dollar.

“Neither do I believe that the United States is such a wonderful place to live and raise a family in. This is a country that spends billions on law enforcement and “homeland security,” but where almost no one feels safe in their own home. This is a nation with the best medical facilities in the world, but where without health insurance you cannot even get a splinter removed. This is the land of the free, at least until the government starts suspecting you are a terrorist.

“And among the Filipinos I have met in the United States, one thing has been nearly as consistent as the surprise that has met my intention to go home. That is if they could keep their higher salaries, if subways could be built in Manila, if the PNP [Philippine National Police] could become less corrupt, if FPJ [Fernando Poe Jr.] could be stopped from becoming president, then they would want to live in the Philippines.

“I am glad that I do not have to worry about having any of these conditions met. This May, no matter what happens, I will be flying home.

“And it will be the easiest ’sacrifice’ I ever had to make.”

It’s a beautiful piece, and a particularly timely one. Notwithstanding the elections, pieces like this will always be timely anytime. But it is particularly welcome these days in the light of Elmer Jacinto almost becoming the rallying cry of the frustrated youth in this benighted country. Jacinto is the young man from the southern province of Basilan (he’s in his late 20s but anyone who is not 40 is young to me now) who topped the medical board exams but is going to work in New York as a caregiver. That too he says — like Gutierrez — without reluctance, without regret, and probably with much thankfulness, if not joy. I did say I did not blame Jacinto for choosing a life of exile abroad after the life of exile he’s lived within in his own country, courtesy of presidents like Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo who have made Basilan synonymous with terrorism. But I did not say he is worth emulating.

As Gutierrez shows, there is another choice, one some others have taken. It requires neither heroism nor sacrifice, though it helps to have idealism and loftiness of mind. But for the most part, it requires only seeing the things that really matter in life.

(To be concluded)

baby blues

I stopped reading the newspaper shortly after the Inquirer unsubscribed from all foreign comic strips. See, I don’t really read the news anyway, I just browse through the headlines. I’ve always thought a good headline gives you most of the information you need. Let’s look at today’s headlines for example:

Palace official clears Akbar’s political foe
Blaming Abus was convenient for probers
GMA and Burma PM meet before summit
Environmentalists want more Asian action on global warming

You kind of get the whole story.

If I find a headline that piques my interest, I read the entire article. Otherwise, I proceed to the opinion columns. If it’s a Thursday I go on to the Lifestyle section because I like reading about food. If it’s a Sunday I read the magazine.

I always end my newspaper experience by doing the crossword but before that, I go and see what my day’s going to be like (yes, i read my horoscope, yours too) and take a peek at Hammie and Zoe’s day because they remind me of Issa and Fiona and Iseck before they moved and became all grown up.

And then one day I was going through my usual newspaper routine and lo and behold, I couldn’t find them! Hammie and Zoe and the new baby whose name I keep forgetting were all gone, replaced with new comic strips which were a little too dramatic for me. I wasn’t planning a boycott but eventually I stopped reading the newspaper and just subscribed to the Inquirer’s RSS headlines just so I’d still know what’s going on.

Last Friday, I was waiting for the rain to stop and out of habit, I picked up the newspaper and started doing the crossword. It was then that I noticed they were back. Hammie and Zoe and the baby whose name I can’t remember were back! I don’t know when the Inquirer started subscribing to the foreign comic strips again but that is the best news I’ve had from them ever since I don’t know when.

So now I’m back to reading the newspaper, err browsing the headlines. I’m back to reading de Quiros and reading my horoscope (yours too) and doing my whole newspaper routine.

But the best thing is that I realized that boycotting, even if it’s unplanned, unannounced, and unofficial, will eventually give you what you want.

So now I’m boycotting you.

International Day for Tolerance

As a kid we were taught that no two people are the same. No two fingerprints are alike, our Science teacher would tell us. There are almost 7 billion people in the world, each of them with different ideals, values, beliefs.

Now, imagine all those people who are so fundamentally different, trying to force their own views onto each other. Imagine the clashes, the misunderstandings, the conflicts.

Of course we don’t really have to do a lot of imagining, we see it happening - armed struggles, civil wars. One word. Mindanao

When you think about it, the only way we can get along with each other is to be tolerant and accepting of other people’s beliefs. We should all just learn live with, and even enjoy, our differences.

Respect. It’s a big word that we can all use. And maybe we can start today.

Today is International Day for Tolerance. It is an annual observance declared by UNESCO in 1995 to declare public awareness of the dangers of intolerance, and to launch a world-wide campaign for tolerance and non-violence. The International Day for Tolerance also serves as an occasion for tolerance education as well as for wider social and political reflection and debate on local and global problems of intolerance.

And in honor of today, I’m posting one of my favorite Sesame Street videos. :)